Today in Supreme Court History: October 14

McConnell v. Rhay, 393 U.S. 2 (decided October 14, 1968): Court holds that its rule of Mempa v. Rhay, 1967 -- the right to counsel in revocation of probation and deferred sentencing proceedings, at least as to felony defendants -- is retroactive (retroactive application is often, though not always, ordered in criminal procedure matters, though it often requires a second case with similar facts to come along)

Arkansas v. Tennessee, 311 U.S. 1 (decided October 14, 1940): Court overrules Arkansas’s objections to Special Master report in this original jurisdiction dispute over various avulsion-created islands in the Mississippi River; the opinion introduced me to the terms “towhead” (shoal) and “thalweg” (zigzag line tracing the deepest points of a river bed as one goes downstream, often used to define a border)

In re Isserman, 348 U.S. 1 (decided October 14, 1954): upon rehearing, attorney gets un-disbarred! (had been disbarred after defending Communist Party members in the “Foley Square trial” which he had obstructed with “repetitious and insolent objections”, resulting in contempt and jail and state disbarment; no reason given for welcoming him back, presumably not with hearts and flowers)

Gonzalez v. Roman Catholic Archbishop of Manila, 280 U.S. 1 (decided October 14, 1929): in dispute over income from a Will which reached the Supreme Court of Philippines (American territory at the time), Court holds First Amendment Free Exercise Clause prohibits civil courts from interfering with decisions of canonical authorities, even those affecting civil rights, absent fraud, collusion or arbitrariness (extended by Serbian Eastern Orthodox Diocese v. Milivojevich, 1976, in which the Court said that not even arbitrariness would be examined) (this was the beginning of the “ministerial exception” to civil rights laws which has allowed Catholic institutions to fire gay teachers)